But in a somewhat joking statement the company said it wasn't
true that its CEO couldn't take criticism.

The spokesperson said: "[If] employees really weren't able to
disagree with Elon, rather than ramping Model 3, Tesla would
currently be focused on building cyborg dragons, implementing a
company-wide policy banning blue shoes, and playing Monty Python
videos on a 24-hour loop in all of the break rooms."

"Cyborg dragons" is a reference to a tweet from Musk from April
of this year.

Tesla also acknowledged that it had fired people from its battery
plant, the Gigafactory, in 2017. The company said it had let go
of people who were "not performing" and were "putting the success
of the entire company ... at risk."

Still, Wired's reporting tallies with
an investigation by Business Insider, which found that Tesla
employees worked extremely long hours and in some cases were
scared to go anywhere near Musk.

Here's Tesla's statement in full:

"It's no secret that the Model 3 production ramp was
excruciatingly difficult for everyone at Tesla. We've been open
about that since the day we delivered the first vehicles and said
we were entering 'production hell.' But Wired's overly-dramatic
and sensationalized tale would have you believe that we somehow
pulled off this incredible feat - and succeeded in achieving
profitability and building a car that no one thought was possible
- by suppressing internal debates and randomly firing people for
no reason or simply because they disagreed with Elon. That
fundamentally does not make sense, as it would literally be
impossible for Tesla to still be here if that's how we operated.
After all, if you were to believe the Wired story and employees
really weren't able to disagree with Elon, rather than ramping
Model 3, Tesla would currently be focused on building cyborg
dragons, implementing a company-wide policy banning blue shoes,
and playing Monty Python videos on a 24-hour loop in all of the
break rooms …

"In order for Tesla to succeed, we must have extremely high
standards and work harder and smarter than everyone else. And
although it is painful, Elon and the company's leadership will
sometimes take the difficult step of letting people go who are
not performing and who are responsible for critical areas of the
business, and who as a result, are putting the success of the
entire company, including 45,000 people and their families, at
risk. This undoubtedly happened at Gigafactory last year when the
module line was the number one bottleneck and challenge facing
Tesla. But Elon cares very deeply about the people with whom he
works - Tesla owes its existence to its employees - and he
basically lived in the factory for months working hand-in-hand
with them to get production on track (though he doesn't even have
a desk in Gigafactory, contrary to Wired's reporting). While this
piece would make for a compelling dramatic screenplay, it's
certainly not news, since that would require it more accurately
reflect reality."